In a Crowd of Thousands
by shannyfish
Summary: While on a case in Sweden, the IRT are after a suspect and Clara goes missing.
1. In the Dark of the Night

_"The parade travelled on, with the sun in my eyes you were gone, but I knew even then in a crowd of thousands I'd find you again." ~ "A Crowd of Thousands" from Anastasia the Musical_

* * *

 **Kiruna, Sweden**

"Clara!"

Her name was being shouted, but it was dark and she was confused. She blinked as she tried to hold her balance. Clara sucked in a breath and looked around for her flashlight and her gun. She didn't see either. Taking a careful step, she opened her mouth to respond back when she heard Jack's voice calling for her again, he sounded worried-

Words never left her mouth.

Pain.

Breath was knocked from her lungs.

Clara fell forward, her face in the snow, and the world around her was pulled away.

* * *

TBC...


	2. A Simple Thing

**En Route to Jokkmokk, Sweden**

"Ravna."

She blinked, confusion hitting her as she woke. She didn't recognize the man that was pushing a hot cup between her hands but she welcomed it just the same. She stared down at the cup and then back at the man. "Where?"

He motioned for her to drink.

After a moment, she did. She looked around, studying her surroundings. Why did nothing feel familiar to her? Why couldn't she recall anything? What had happened? "I can't-"

He motioned again.

Frowning, she finally sipped at it. It was bitter, but it tasted so good. She wasn't really cold, but the warm drink warmed her insides comfortingly just the same. She realized that she remembered snow. That was the only memory she could conjure. "I don't remember anything," she said as she looked to the old man. His face was riddled with wrinkles that only seemed to deepen when he smiled. He had a white beard that showed his age while whatever hair was atop his head was hidden under his knitted hat that was beautifully designed with bright red, yellow, and blue. "Why don't I remember?"

"Ravna," he said again. He moved to sit next to her, nudging her cup so that she would drink more. Then other words flowed from his mouth and she realized that she didn't understand...well, some words sounded familiar but it wasn't the language that she was speaking.

"Is Ravna my name?" she asked in confusion. If she knew him, shouldn't she understand him?

He pointed at her. "Ravna," he spoke clearly.

It didn't feel right.

Was it supposed to?

"I don't…" she mumbled.

"Ravna," he repeated.

"Who are you?" There was a long string of silence that followed her query, he tilted his head, and she swore that he understood the language that she was speaking. If he did, then why didn't he reply to her in it? Why was he only furthering her confusion?

"Ahhči," the old man told her as he pressed his hand to his chest.

"I don't understand."

"Ahhči," he repeated.

"Ahhči, I heard you...but what does it mean? Is it a name? A title? A-"

And when he spoke this time, she understood even though it wasn't the language she'd been speaking. His words were loving and so heartfelt. "Father," he said in this other language, she knew it had a name but she didn't know either name to the languages she seemed to know. "I am your father." He smiled like he had this weight taken from him and instead was replaced with this bright light. "I have waited for so long for you to return."

The other language came from her surprisingly so, like her brain understood what was happening, it just shifted all on its own without her even thinking about it. "Where did I go?"

"You were taken from me."

"How?"

"There was a great storm. We were travelling...one moment you were there, the next you were gone...lost in the white."

She blinked. "But you found me again?"

"I saw a white reindeer...and then the next moment you were there...it was like it was bringing you back to me, signaling me to your location."

"I don't remember any of it."

"You will."

"Where are we?" she questioned as she looked around the structure they were in. It wasn't the structure she was questioning, but the name of the place the structure was in.

"We are not far from Jokkmokk."

"We must take what we have there soon for festival. You remember. We always go."

She just shook her head. "I don't."

"When we get there," he said as though he were speaking the wisest thing. "You will."

* * *

TBC...


	3. Time Passes

**Kiruna, Sweden**

Jack just stared at the foreign currency they'd pinned to either side of the entrance to their conference area on the plane. He hadn't pinned up any currency yet. They'd found their Americans and helped solve the crime, but they'd lost one of their own. It wasn't that a member of his team had died, it was just that they had no idea what had happened to her.

Clara.

He rubbed his face and sucked in a breath, holding it for a moment before blowing it out. She'd been missing without a trace for over two weeks. The team had been out looking for her. The Polisen, the Swedish Police Authority, had been out looking as well. No one had seen her or had any information that led anywhere.

"Jack?"

Looking up, he found Simmons standing there. He looked serious, even more serious than everyone had been looking since Clara had gone missing. "What can I do for you, Matt?"

"I got a call from home," Simmons said.

"Is Kristy okay?"

"That's not who I got the call from," he explained. He was quiet for a long moment. "I got a call from _your_ boss...because apparently you're not returning calls. That we were supposed to already be back in Virginia."

Jack was quiet. He knew that something would happen when someone else would be contacted or someone would come looking for them. Monty had said that he was trying to stall for them as much as he could, but at the same time Jack didn't want him to lose his job. "I know."

"But Clara's still out there."

He nodded. "All I keep thinking about is that she's out there, she could be hurt, and we haven't a clue," Jack admitted. "I _can't_ give up on Clara, it's my fault that Brad was lost-"

"That _wasn't_ your fault, Jack...we all know it and _Clara_ _knows it_."

"What would _you_ do, Matt?" Jack asked Simmons. Right now, he was having a hard time and he was certain that it was because he was emotionally and personally involved (which he would be for any member of his team), but maybe he was even more involved because it was Clara.

Simmons was quiet for a long moment. "We've been here for two weeks and we have nothing to go on." He paused again. Maybe he was thinking or maybe he was trying to put together his words a certain way. "Sometimes, though, you have to do what you don't want to do and have faith in the people that we leave behind."

"I don't think we should ever leave someone behind."

"I don't either, but I think this one time, we're going to have to," Simmons told him.

"As horrible as it sounds, I think that it's going to be the best for everyone mentally. We've been _all_ having a hard time and...and Clara can take care of herself," Matt pointed out. "She speaks Swedish, right?"

"Yes and she adapts well."

"She traveled for two years during her sabbatical learning about new cultures and learning new languages," Simmons reminded. "We're not leaving here without resources. The locals have been looking for Clara too and they were talking about expanding the search, but right now...maybe our place is home."

And that was hard for him to hear.

He wanted to say that they needed to be there, that if they left then no one would be looking for Clara, but at the same time he knew that if things were reversed that he'd want them to go home. Jack wouldn't want their team to get into trouble because he was lost. They were all capable in their own ways and Clara was capable.

"Okay, let's get everyone back on board and let Monty know we're heading home," Jack said as he got up from the chair. "I'll go and make the calls to my bosses."

* * *

 **IRT Jet, leaving Swedish airspace**

As they left Sweden, all Jack felt was guilt.

"You know it's going to be something like we get home and Clara's called headquarters," Mae said, trying to keep things light. "She's probably been holed up with some locals and is learning their traditions or something. There's that whole subset culture when we were in Kiruna. What are they called?"

"The ones with the bold colored traditional looking clothing?" Simmons asked.

"Yeah, they herd reindeer," Mae said.

"The Sami."

"Right! I mean, they totally seem like people Clara would want to talk to and learn things from," Mae went on.

Maybe they were right or maybe it was just nice to think about. He sat there quiet for a moment, still unable to let go of the guilt he felt or the worry. Jack didn't know how they put on smiles and act like Clara was going to magically appear stateside once the plane's ramp lowered. He knew Clara, he trusted her, and he knew that she was capable...but this? He was convinced that Mae and Simmons had to be putting on some facade for him and likely for themselves as well. How else could they all stay sane?

"I wish I had your confidence," he said quietly and quite honestly.

* * *

 **Falls Church, Virginia**

Clara wasn't waiting for them when they landed.

It didn't end there.

No, it stretched on.

First they were home a week, all of them on leave and catching up on paperwork and being evaluated. There were also several 'meetings' about what had happened. Jack didn't feel like they were being investigated, but that they were really just trying to make sure that all the 'i's were dotted and the 't's were crossed on all official paperwork involved Clara being missing overseas.

Jack thought that the first week would be the hardest, but it wasn't. It had gone by fairly quickly, the FBI had kept them busy the moment their feet had hit the ground...and if it wasn't the FBI then it was his family. As much as he'd enjoyed all of the family time, he couldn't shake his own feelings about Clara.

"Tomorrow it'll be better, you'll see," Karen had told him.

She'd been wrong.

His wife had been right about a lot of things in their life, but this time...she'd been dead wrong. After a week back, they'd been sent on a mission...their first mission without Clara. It had been a lot harder to get on the plane. The BAU had offered to lend an agent of their choosing if he wanted, but Jack was certain that that would only make things more difficult and far more of a reminder than Clara just not being there. The team's first mission back was on a murder of an American student in Australia.

Three weeks later, they'd already been to five other locations around the world.

All without Clara.

It was heart wrenching.

* * *

 **IRT Jet, enroute to Virginia**

Jack had told Simmons and Mae that he was tired and that he was going to lay down. In the bunks, all he did was stare up at the bunk bottom above where he was laying. His thoughts were on Clara.

It would get easy, they'd told him.

It didn't.

It only got harder.

When he thought about Clara, it was easy to remember all of her smiles. All of the ways that she'd made him smile and laugh. To remember what a truly remarkable human being she was with an absolutely wonderfully matching armored spirit. But he also remembered that night in Sweden and the immediate feeling he'd felt when they'd realized that she was missing, the way that his insides twisted and he felt physically ill.

His fingers moved across each bead, as if rubbing them could somehow help the situation. It was a simple beaded bracelet made from handmade beads and leather cording. Clara always purchased something small from nearly every place the IRT visited and where she'd traveled to, almost like putting up their money on the board. She liked to purchase things like the bracelet from small local artisans in the area they were working. Jack couldn't remember where the bracelet had been picked up from, but he remembered finding it the week before in his bag and figuring that it must have dropped into there when he and Clara had been on the plane last.

There was something calming about having the bracelet, though he was certain that Clara would have a different comment for his stroking of each bead between his fingers on her bracelet. He smiled at the thought. Jack didn't care, it was soothing...the first thing to him that even slightly made the guilt he felt fade (even if it was only temporary). "Where are you?" he whispered to the bracelet. He knew it wouldn't answer him, but he wished that God would send him some kind of sign...or an arrow in the right direction.

A sign.

That's all he wanted.

* * *

TBC…


End file.
